


just a little rush

by bluspirits



Category: Daredevil (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Backstory, Canon Disabled Character, Character Study, Gen, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 12:45:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7977235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluspirits/pseuds/bluspirits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Milla Donovan might have a thing for danger. </p>
<p>And Matt Murdock is nothing if not dangerous.</p>
            </blockquote>





	just a little rush

**Author's Note:**

> Milla Donovan deserved better 2k16
> 
> Seeing if I can make this work for the 'it didn't feel wrong' square on my Daredevil Bingo card. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :D

It started with an apple tree. The big apple tree in the backyard of her grandparent's house outside the city in the middle of July. 

It was really hot out that day, and an eleven year old Milla had been laying in the shade of the tree for about an hour. 

She was a little bored. Laying in the smothering heat wasn’t the most exciting way to pass the time. With a sigh of 'I'm so desperate that I'm actually going to do this', she stood and placed her palm against the rough and scratchy bark of the tree. The soft grass tickled her bare feet. 

Before she could stop to give it too much thought, she raised one leg and pressed her foot to the tree trunk. She reached up and wrapped her fingers around the nearest branch her hand found. Then she pulled herself up, feet scrambling for purchase on the trunk and her free hand searching for another branch. 

Everyone in her family would tell her to stop and get down, not to do this. But it didn't feel wrong to Milla. 

She wound up balanced, hanging over the branch, legs dangling. If she had to guess, she'd say she was probably three or four feet off the ground. She took as deep of a breath as she could with the branch digging into her stomach. Then she flipped herself over and moved so she was sitting on the branch. 

Her hand reached out to press against the tree trunk. She stood slowly, toes hanging slightly off the branch, palm still flat against the trunk.

It was now, already one branch up, and reaching for the next, that it hit her: climbing trees blind was a bit of a challenge. But that thought didn't change her actions at all. 

She kept one hand on the tree and stretched the other out to find the next branch.

The branches got thinner the higher up she got. A couple of times, she almost lost her footing. But she was close to the top. One more step, probably. 

She grabbed the trunk with one hand, a thin bending branch with another, and placed her foot on the sturdiest limb she could find. For a second, she thought she had made it, until she heard the branch her foot was resting on begin to crack. Panicking, she let go of the trunk and moved her foot to a different branch as quick as she could. It didn’t save her. 

Her foot slipped, bark scratching her, and the sharp flash of panic and adrenaline kicked in. Everything else became irrelevant. The only thing she could hear was her own racing heart, the only thing that mattered was catching herself. 

She didn’t. Her arms moved fast, but not fast enough. Her fingers caught on branches, but without the grip needed to stop her fall.  


It wasn’t a high fall, but the feeling of open air, the rush of blood through her veins, the feeling of nothing below her, was amazing. While she was falling time felt slower, but once it was over, it felt far too short. 

She hit the ground hard, and the grass that had felt so soft when she had been laying in it earlier did nothing to break her fall. She landed on her elbow, her whole weight hitting it, and she felt a sharp pain in her arm. The adrenaline took some of the edge off, but it was obvious she had messed up her arm. 

She left her head hit the ground and took a deep breath, waiting until her heart stopped pounding. It took a while. 

That was the first time Milla broke her arm. It wouldn’t be the last. 

\--

"Fuck, man. That car is gorgeous," Robbie said, before taking a long drink of his beer. 

Helen thumped her hand against the hood of her father's restored '71 Impala. "And we've got her all night. You can take her for a ride," 

Sixteen year old Milla pulled her sweater tighter around her shoulders against the cold wind. They were out on the flats, outside of town. Everything was fields for miles. It was a surprisingly cool summer night, almost fall, and Helen and Robbie, her friends when she was out at her grandparent's during the summer, had decided to take a ride. 

Helen had brought her dad's car and Robbie had brought his mom's alcohol. Everyone was a little drunk. Except Milla. She was the designated driver (ha). 

"So who wants first go?" Helen asked with a laugh, shaking the keys. This was probably a rhetorical question, considering Robbie was the only one there who could actually drive. 

But Milla grinned and raised her hand. She wasn't sure why, it just kind of happened. 

Helen was silent for a minute, before tossing Milla the keys. It was a good throw, one that landed squarely in her palm. 

She walked forward to where she knew the car was and ran her hand along it, looking for the driver's side door. 

She pulled it open and sat down in the driver’s seat. She didn’t bother putting on her seatbelt, just felt around for the ignition. She slid the key in and turned it, feeling the engine begin to hum. Placing her hands on the steering wheel, she took a steadying breath. 

"This might be a bad idea," Robbie said, words a little slurred. Milla turned back, even though she can't see him. It didn't feel like a bad idea. No, it felt like it would be a great time. 

“Brake’s the big one on the left, gas is the thin one,” Helen shouts at her, instead of responding to Robbie. 

“I know that,” Milla snapped back, even though she didn’t really. She grabbed the gearshift and pushed it back, hoping that would do something. She pressed down on the brake and felt the car shake. Then she hit the gas. 

Maybe a little too hard to be safe, looking back, but Milla wasn’t going for safe. And with the top of the car down, the wind rushing through her hair felt a little like falling. 

“Woah!” Robbie shouted, but his voice was quiet and far away. 

She yanked the steering wheel to the left and the car spun. Her shoulders knocked against the door, jarring her. 

She slammed her foot down on the gas again, and the car shot forward. She turned the wheel left, then right, then left again, making the car zigzag sharply. Then she turned it all the way to the right as hard as she could and held it there, making the car spin in donuts. 

She straightened out and drove forward.

She laughed, and took her hands from the wheel, raising them in the air, foot still on the gas. She could hear Robbie and Helen shouting, but couldn’t make out the words over the wind and the pounding of her blood. 

The shouting got louder and closer, until she could hear what they were saying. 

“Stop! Milla! Stop!” 

She must have been close to them, and she panicked (and not in the good way). She used the brake for the first time, pounding her foot down onto it as hard as she could. The car stopped more suddenly than she expected and she went flying forward. Her head slammed into the steering wheel, and everything went quiet. 

That was the first time Milla got a concussion. It wasn’t the last. 

\--

Milla stood on the edge of a cliff, above a former quarry that now served as a lake, with her toes just hanging off the rocks. A warm breeze blew her short hair back. She could hear the people down in the water shout. 

The water below was freezing. So cold, it could be hard to swim if you were out in the center. Kids had almost drowned, muscles seizing up from the cold. They all joked about hypothermia every year. Still, it was the best relief from the summer heat. 

The place where she was standing was probably the best place to jump. So far, no one had hit any hidden rocks in this area. On other ledges nearby, people have jumped onto unnoticed rock piles and broken bones, but this section is a rare injury free zone. 

She let out a deep breath and leaned forward. 

“Come on, Milla! Get in here!” someone shouted from in the water. She didn’t know who it was, she was too focused on the idea of the jump. The tension and anticipation started to get her heart racing. Everything narrowed down to this one single moment. It was like the apple tree, but a thousand times better. For one, the jump was so much higher. Almost twenty feet, they told her. And this time she was doing it on purpose. 

She took a couple of steps back. Then ran forward and jumped. 

Her feet left the ground and within a second she was falling. The wind was so fast she couldn’t hear anything. She smiled and screamed in happiness. Every single thought was gone from her head. All she could feel was her own pulse. 

Her legs curled up, bracing her body for the water, not high enough for a cannonball, but still bent near her chest. 

All the breath was knocked out of her body as she hit the water. 

And the cold. Oh God, the cold. All the muscles in her body tensed and froze. She could swear her heart stopped for a minute. All around her, so much cold, squeezing on her brain, like icicles stabbing into her skin. It was like coming out of the desert and being shoved into a freezer. She couldn’t think at all, like the worst case of brain freeze. 

She kicked hard, trying to get her head above water, but the arch of her one foot cramped up. She made it after a few seconds, face breaking the surface. She pushed her hair out of her eyes with shaking fingers and treaded water. When she could finally get her lungs to work again, she sighed and pulled her legs up so she was floating on her back, warm sun on one half of her body, freezing water on the other. 

She stayed in until she could no longer feel most of her body. When she got out, her friends told her that her fingers and toes were purple. 

It felt perfect. 

\--

When Milla first met Matt, she was swept off her feet. And she thinks now that this will be a recurring theme for the rest of their relationship, whatever it may be. 

It'll all probably go something like this: Dangerous situation occurs, Matt is heavily involved, and Milla finds herself carried along by association.  


And in the back of her head, she kind of likes the sound of that. Kind of. The part of her that fell from an apple tree, drove a car, and jumped from a cliff kind of likes that. Doesn't mind the idea of some danger. (of a lot of danger)

But everything rational in her head is telling her this is a terrible idea. Because Matt is not an apple tree, or an old car, or a quarry cliff. 

But god, it doesn't feel wrong. It doesn't feel scary (and if maybe it does deep down, it's the right amount) In fact, it feels perfect. The logical extension of the apple tree, the car, the cliff, and every other stunt she's pulled. 

But Matt Murdock is a whole nother level. He's a stroll down the darkest alley in the roughest neighborhood, he's like leaning all the way off the edge of a skyscraper. He's something very different. Something new and exciting.

Congratulations Milla Donovan, lower case daredevil. You've just gone pro. 

She's not sure she'll survive the experience. But she thinks it might just be worth it.


End file.
